Long Island experts debate health care reform

Just days before the U.S. Supreme Court hears a case challenging mandates in the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, health care experts on Long Island and the nation remain as divided as ever about the regulations.

Although it has been nearly two years since the 2,000-page bill was signed into law on March 23, 2010, panelists at LIBN’s Power Breakfast – Health Care’s Hazy Future today at the Crest Hollow Country Club in Woodbury presented starkly different appraisals as to whether reform will work – and whether it will remain intact.

The Supreme Court on March 26 plans to hear oral arguments on repealing key portions of the legislation, which has become a key target of Republican contenders. A Republication president or Republican-controlled Congress could still derail some or much of the legislation, which has only just begun to be implemented.

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“I am very much for repealing ObamaCare. If you don’t repeal ObamaCare, it’s going to build. The costs are going to grow,” said Raymond J. Keating, chief economist for the Small Business and Entrepreneurship Council. “If you don’t repeal ObamaCare, it’s going to keep inching forward and grab more power or financing or spending from the government.”

Some other panelists said the nation can’t turn back the clock to the crisis before reform, creating a prescription for soaring costs and failure.

“That is not sustainable for individuals, for small or large businesses,” said Gwen O’Shea, CEO of the Health and Welfare Council of Long Island. “Repealing the bill would only perpetuate that rise in cost.”

Still others said two years after the legislation passed, the focus should be on ways of improving rather than fighting to repeal the act.

“While I think there are plenty of problems with the bill, the fact that we have attacked the issues of providing quality health care and access to quality health care for everyone is an important thing,” said Thomas McAteer, senior vice president for the East Region for Aetna Medicaid. “I think this has got to be fixed. I have my doubts that it will be repealed.”

The Pew Research Foundation and Kaiser Family Foundation found the population is evenly divided on the legislation, but opinions in large part reflect political ideology – and even depend on how questions are phrased.

Kaiser also found that less than 40 percent say they are “closely following the court case” and only 58 percent are confident that the “health care law is in fact still on the books.”

“At the end of the day, we don’t do this particularly well in the United States,” said Dr. Stacey E. Rosen, vice president for clinical services for Katz Institute for Women’s Health. “We have a system that is exceptionally expensive and exceptionally inefficient. To say that this is good enough is just unacceptable to many of us.”

According to the Kaiser survey, only 33 percent expect the court to uphold the individual mandate. And only 54 percent said the court’s interpretation of the law will play a major role in their decision, while half believe justices’ ideology and politics will play a major role.

“We’ve got to get away from the politics of this thing. And I’m a lobbyist representing hospitals,” Nassau-Suffolk Hospital council CEO Kevin Dahill said. “If we allow our health care policy to be driven by the kind of partisan politics we now have in this country, we’re not going to get anything done that is in any way reasonable.”

While some argue states and the federal government could come up with another system or simply modify the current approach, others said dismantling federal reform in such a divisive environment would amount to blocking major changes.

“The false argument is to suggest that repeal will lead to reform. It is an insane argument,” McAteer said. “Because what came before it is what we have.”

After years of debate, Keating said the fate of the health care legislation could be in the hands of one Supreme Court Justice viewed as a swing vote. “It depends on which side of the bed Justice Anthony Kennedy gets up on,” he said.

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““I am very much for repealing ObamaCare. If you don’t repeal ObamaCare, it’s going to build. The costs are going to grow,” said Raymond J. Keating, chief economist for the Small Business and Entrepreneurship Council. “If you don’t repeal ObamaCare, it’s going to keep inching forward and grab more power or financing or spending from the government.”

What fool at LIBN considered a demagogue like Keating an “expert” on health care, and what else did they expect him to add to the debate besides the above quote?

Health insurance costs have doubled over the past decade. Did he have anything to say about that?

Warren Buffet called healthcare in the U.S. a tapeworm. Plus the AFL-CIO reported this; health care reform has helped America’s families cover 2.5 million of their young adult children, saved 5.1 million Medicare (seniors and disabled) recipients $3.2 billion in drug costs and so far has generated about $323 million in health insurance premium rebates to consumers from insurers.

So why did this group get together? It’s like re-arranging the deck chairs on the titanic.

Weather he’s an economist or not, the plain fact is that the entire plan was supposed to make premium costs go down. The costs still continue to rise at the same alarming rates as before 2008, with no signs of slowing down.

Facts, not politics, not ideology, not counter productive lobbying that spends incredible amounts of money that would be better spent treating patients or researching cures… facts and our facing up to them will enable all Americans to obtain healthcare at lower costs and with better outcomes.

I don’t have to read past the term “Obamacare” to know where a writer is coming from, and it’s not a good place. Now hear this! The health care financing non-system that’s been in place all along has worked only for the rich or for those whose group health insurance has not been taken away by job loss. How can umpteen insurance companies with a myriad of forms – that increase exponentially – be more cost-efficient or helpful to the individual or family than a one-payer system? There is nothing wrong with Medicare except the providers who abuse it and encourage patients/clients to do the same.

The best cure for this broken non-system is a REAL system into which all working people pay and by which all are covered. If you think medical care is a commodity which should be available only to those who can pay for it out of pocket, you’re living in a dream world. Even if you think a hospital should turn away sick people who are without insurance – and it shouldn’t – that’s not going to happen. Your health insurance premiums and your taxes will continue to go up to cover the uninsured. Get over the labels and support what makes sense.

About the Author

Claude Solnik covers healthcare, finance, and technology/energy for Long Island Business News.